


A Crowded Couch

by quartetship



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Holidays, JEM Week, M/M, OT3, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Polyamory, erejeanmarco - Freeform, jem - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 12:31:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3381635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quartetship/pseuds/quartetship
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Originally posted on tumblr for JEM Week, in celebration of the holidays. From the same universe as <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/2761031">'Give Thanks'.</a></p>
<p>Hope you enjoy!</p>
<p>--</p>
    </blockquote>





	A Crowded Couch

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on tumblr for JEM Week, in celebration of the holidays. From the same universe as ['Give Thanks'.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2761031)
> 
> Hope you enjoy!
> 
> \--

**_(Movies)_ **

It starts with a movie night in late December, just a chance for Jean to get out of his cramped apartment on one of the last few evenings before a holiday he doesn't even celebrate. Not that the tiny space that Eren and Marco share is much better, especially crowded with poorly wrapped gifts and a possibly stolen tree. But it's warmer, more comfortable, and even though Jean feels out of place on the couch beside the other two as they cuddle, he'd rather be there than almost anywhere else.  
  
When Marco idly glances out the window after the third movie ends, remarking that the snow's too heavy for travel, Jean heaves a sigh and resigns himself to his end of the couch for the evening. Marco ducks into the kitchen, leaving Jean and a peacefully sleeping Eren behind to make drinks, and when he returns, he settles a little closer to Jean's curled feet.  
  
They talk over steaming cups, and the fourth movie is already at its halfway point before Jean realizes with a yawn that it's well after midnight. Marco doesn't offer to leave the room, though, and Jean is of no mind to ask him to. Instead he lets himself relax back into the mismatched cushions at the couch's corner, and pretend the warmth he feels radiating from the cup in his hands to the whole of his chest is entirely platonic.   
  
Still in a comfortable daze, it's not Marco's arm sliding down over his shoulder that he notices first. It's the stretch of Eren's hand as he lies across Marco's lap, draping his arm so that it falls into Jean's as well. It's the way Eren cracks open one eye, smiling lazily as he curls his fingers unapologetically over Jean's. And it's the way Marco laughs under his breath - maybe just a little nervously - as he looks down at Jean and whispers, "this okay?"  
  
Jean doesn't respond for a moment, shaken silent by sitting on the cusp of something he's been afraid to even acknowledge wanting. But he finally moves when Marco starts to pull away, dropping his head into the crook of Marco's neck, and wrapping his hand tightly over Eren's to make his point.   
  
"More than," he softly replies, and it's not much, but it's a start.   
  
The snow comes and goes over the next few days, but nearly every morning finds Jean curled up on a crowded couch, with movie titles quietly repeating in the background. That year - for the first time in his life - the 25th of December has meaning. For once on Christmas morning on a couch that's seen better days, though none happier than this - things seem to fall into place.   
  
\--

**_(Stockings)_**  
  
Their first Christmas isn't much of a first.   
  
They've really been  _together_ since before last Christmas, though official titles came later. They've been through most of the awkward  _'how's this going to work'_ details that any three people might face, and they've even made strides at future plans, loose though they might be. But it feels different, still feels  _new_  somehow, and Marco is determined to make it special.  
  
They still don't have much in the way of decorations. With Jean handling the gift wrapping, things are much neater, but their tree is still a small one stolen from a local lot, and they don't have  _any_  Hanukkah decorations, despite Jean assuring them both that that's the  _last_  thing he needs to feel included. So Marco saves a few days worth of tips from work, and sets out one evening to find something to brighten things up, in honor of what he insists on calling their  _first Christmas._  
  
When Eren gets home that evening, Jean is with him, and they immediately cease their bickering when they step through the door and are each met with one of Marco's outstretched arms. A few exchanges of  _'how was your day'_  later, they settle at their crowded table, Jean popping open the pizza box he'd laid between them. They're nearly finished with their food before they notice - but when they finally do, Eren's face splits into a blinding smile and Jean is left staring, willing himself not to cry.   
  
Three stockings hang on the wall above their small pantry, alike but for their colors, their silk embroidery and the style of the letters. Marco's name is written in simple gold block print across the top of a green stocking. Eren's is in bold, playful font, matching his stocking's vivid red. And between them in blue, is a stocking with Jean's name in flowing silver script, scrawled above the Hebrew version of a holiday greeting. He stares at it for a long time, trying to think of how to adequately express how much a stupid blue sock means to him.  
  
"Pretty legit, babe," Eren grins, prodding Marco in the arm before rising from the table to inspect the stockings further. Marco turns to look at Jean, sliding a hand over his and squeezing, and all Jean can do is nod, never having found one of Eren's phrases so fitting before.  
  
 _"Pretty legit,"_  he repeats, and Marco smiles.   
  
\--

**_(Song)_**  
  
 _"I really don't care,"_  Jean had always told them.   
  
It doesn't matter to him, he insists, that every song, every movie, every greeting on people's minds and lips in November and December is about Christmas. Having long since gotten in the habit of celebrating it with them - and being a poorly observant Jew, at best - he really doesn't care either way about the sweeping aside of the Festival of Lights, he says. But after more than two years, the others know him well enough to know when he's lying.  
  
There is still a part of him that looks glassed over when people mention Christmas. Still a small pull at the corner of his lips when one of his aunts calls to ask him what he's doing for First Night that year. And he still smiles like a delighted child at the glow of candles, reflecting from brass, even if he only does so when he thinks no one can see him.   
  
So when a mid-December night brings snow and a night stuck inside their now shared apartment, Jean does his best to suppress that same fondly reminiscent smile when Marco suggests he make dinner for them.   
  
"You should make latkes," Marco mentions, arms looping around Jean's waist from behind. "If we have the stuff, I mean."  
  
"Yeah," Jean nodded. "I think we do." He sets to making dinner, letting the loud popping of the shallow pan of cooking oil hide the sounds of his contented humming.   
  
When he brings them to the table, they dig into the plate without ceremony, and Jean's face falls just slightly. But with his stomach and his mouth still full, Eren mumbles his gratitude, and begins humming a song once he's swallowed a final mouthful of potatoes, almost as a joke, at first.  
  
Jean looks up from poking his plate, Eren's song just loud enough to be heard as it becomes more clear. Eren takes a drink and clears his throat, his humming turning to timid singing as he quietly chants words in uncertain Hebrew, Jean staring in disbelief.   
  
When he finally finishes his song, his voice is shaking, and Jean only then realizes that Marco has been singing along, holding Eren's hand with a supportive smile. They look back at Jean and wait, and when he does nothing but swallow thickly in response, Marco speaks for them, a soft, warm wish of,  _"Happy Hanukkah, Jean."_  
  
It's the first time in years that Jean cries in front of them, but not the first time that dinner ends in hugs and kisses and laughter so hard that it lands them all in the kitchen floor in a pile. And though it's the first time they pile in front of the computer to shop for a menorah, the first time they call Jean's relatives and send their wishes - the first time they do something that's  _just for him_  - it's certainly not the last.   
  
Jean does the cooking for the rest of the week, Eren consuming more fried food than is probably strictly advisable, but it's the happiest holiday any of them can remember. In the glow of the candles every night at sundown, Christmas is almost an afterthought.  
  
\--

**_(Surprise)_**  
  
"Yeah, it's... a surprise."  
  
That's all Eren tells his boyfriends about the gift he's 'picking up' for them, a gift he's spent an entire afternoon retrieving. By the time the December sun begins to set, Marco is worried, and Jean is frustrated by the fact that he knows Eren must've gone way overboard for them this Christmas. The first of them to land a halfway comfortable salary, there's no telling what ridiculous 'surprise' he's chosen to blow his holiday bonus on.  
  
He and Marco are both surprised when he comes in that evening without a single box or bag - only a soft strip of cotton gently taped across his wrist. He smiles sheepishly down at it when they look him over, and Marco is the one to carefully pull it away, though they're both confused by what they see beneath it.   
  
A small tattoo, the tiny image of a green gem. Inside it are three letters, 'JEM' in equally minuscule print. When neither Jean nor Marco reacts, Eren huffs an impatient explanation.   
  
"It's a  _gem,_  get it? Like... JEM? Jean, Eren, Marco - it means  _us."_  He looks down at it, a little crestfallen that they don't seem excited. "I just thought... it's like a commitment thing. Y'know? 'Cause we talked about rings, but... yeah." He makes to shuffle out from under their stares, but Marco grabs him around the middle and spins him in place, only putting him down again to share the task of peppering him in kisses with Jean. Eren bats them away after a few moments, catching his breath from giggling.   
  
"So yeah?' he asks, grinning widely. Jean and Marco nod in unison.   
  
"Yeah," Jean repeats. "But you know what this means, right?"  
  
"No tying me up until it heals?" Eren teases, and Jean swats him even as he drops a playful bite onto his shoulder.  
  
"It means  _we've_  both gotta get one too," Marco offers. "And then... somehow explain them to our crazy families."  
  
"Eh, you can probably cover 'em up til next Christmas - maybe a few more years if you're lucky." Eren grins, and Marco knows he's teasing, but he pulls him in for a hug and mumbles against the warmth of his neck, shaking his head.  
  
"Maybe this should be the year that we come clean with everybody, yeah?"  
  
Eren shrugs, holding out a hand to pull Jean over to him, tangling him up in their embrace as well.   
  
"That's one surprise I think we should talk about first."   
  
And though it's nearly a year later when they finally do, the sting of surprising their families isn't even as bad as the twinge of the needle that marks their skin, permanently - over quickly, not as painful as they expect. They're glad they did it, glad for each other, and smile a little wider from then on, every time they catch each other by the wrists.  
  
\--

**_(Sweaters)_**  
  
"I'm not wearing it."  
  
Jean had been in flat refusal since the oversized package had arrived on their doorstep the weekend after Thanksgiving, and even on the Morning of Christmas eve, he still isn't swayed. Marco tugs his own sweater on, Eren doing the same, and they look back at Jean expectantly.   
  
"Mom made these for us," Marco whines.  _"All_ of us. That's a huge step forward, and we need to take it." He holds out Jean's sweater - a gray and blue monstrosity with shiny silver stitching - and waits. Jean takes it with a huff.  
  
"I'm gonna look as stupid as I feel," Jean grouses, pulling it over his head. "Why couldn't she have bought us something? Show her acceptance with a matching set of gift cards or a few bottles of wine."  
  
"Because this  _means_  more," Marco insists, and his fragile, genuine tone stops Jean's complaining. "And it would mean a lot to me if you boys would just wear them for the day, and thank her for them."  
  
Jean sighs as he pulls the loose sleeves down over his cold fingers and toes at the carpet. "Yeah. Yeah, alright. I'm sorry."  
  
Marco is stepping forward to pull him into a hug when Eren breezes past between them, hands dragging suggestively across two sets of legs as he heads for the door, not stopping to look back as he almost  _sings_  a promise over his shoulder.  
  
"Yeah, 'n when we get home, we can take 'em off.  _Together."_  
  
\--

**_(Lights)_**  
  
"Is it straight?"  
  
Marco adjusts the star atop their tree, standing back so Jean and Eren can examine it. Eren nods excitedly; Jean crosses his arms and shrugs.   
  
"I guess. Still think it doesn't go with the rest of it."   
  
Their star is a Star of David, chosen by Marco to top off the strange hodgepodge of ornaments and trimmings they've collected over the years, ranging from Eren's Disney memorabilia to Marco's collection of handmade treasures from his (their?) nieces and nephews. The star is pristine and pretty and looks out of place, but Jean is secretly proud of it, proud of its place at the top of everything that is theirs.   
  
"It looks fine!" Eren insists, snaking arms over Jean's shoulders to cling to his back. Jean pulls him the rest of the way up without thinking, hooking arms under his bent legs to hold him there as Eren settles his chin atop Jean's mussed hair. "Makes me think of you, all sparkly and shiny and Jewish and stuff."  
  
"I'm a sparkly Jew?" Jean asks, unable to keep himself from smiling along when Marco loses it. Eren just nods into Jean's hair and Jean doesn't argue.   
  
"I think it goes with the rest of it just fine," Marco agrees. "Because it's  _ours._  All of it."  
  
He's right, of course. The star, the ornaments - even the tree, fairly purchased and legally owned - belongs to the three of them, along with the house they've set it all up in for the first time. Their stockings hang behind it on a real mantle, and a fire crackles beneath them. It's all perfect and beautiful and slightly mismatched, and its all  _theirs._  
  
Jean smiles as he drops Eren off of his back onto their couch, and flops down after him, pulling Marco along. A new place, new jobs, new things - it's been a very good year, this, their fifth or sixth. Jean stopped counting a long time ago, but when he stops to think about the fact that the dates have changed but the faces haven't, he smiles and throws an arm around both of them. The lights on the tree are brand new, but their glow is as soft and well-worn as the look of love on all of their faces as they settle into a familiar, comfortable pile, together.  
  
\--

**_(Naughty or Nice)_**  
  
They've done this for a decade now, wrapping gifts the night before Christmas because they were too busy, too distracted, too  _lazy_  to buy them early. Marco watches Jean agonize over perfecting the creases of the shiny paper before taping them, content to curl ribbons while Jean does the bulk of the work. It's the way they've always done things. And even in recent years, with all the changes they've seen, that small detail has remained the same.   
  
"You think they're in bed, yet?" Jean asks after a long stretch of silence, an he and Marco both lean an ear closer to their closed door, listening for the sounds of laughter. When they hear silence instead, Jean is the first to stand and stretch, Marco following him out the door and down the hall to peek into the living room.   
  
The final notes of Rudolph still playing softly on the television, their two tiny daughters are curled up on the couch, each under one of Eren's heavy arms as he snores softly between them. Lit by the soft light of the tree, the three of them are fast asleep, tired from hours of tickles and giggles, fingers and faces still dusted with sugar from too many cookies. Jean and Marco just watch them for a few moments, smiling at the complete picture their family makes now. But Santa must come, lest they have two  _very_  unhappy little girls the next morning, so with some careful prying, they lift them out of Eren's arms and into their own.  
  
They each carry a child to bed, tucking them under blankets before tucking gifts under the tree. When they return to retrieve Eren, he's too peaceful a sight to disturb, smiling blissfully in his sleep. They decide to settle on either side of him instead, lifting him into their laps as they lay arms across each other to cuddle in front of the glow of the tree, remembering warmly the Christmas ten years before, when their family got its start.   
  
The ink on their wrists seems to stand out more in the muted light, Jean notices, and it's his final thought before drifting off to sleep, satisfied that his children are asleep, and perfectly happy to be back where it all began, sharing a crowded couch with the two people he loves most. 


End file.
